Scholars
by May a Chance
Summary: When the World Scholar's Cup hosts a round in Las Vegas, it is an opportunity Spencer can't bear to pass up.
When Spencer had first caught wind of the event, he had been a strange mix of emotions. There had been his excitement, palpable on his expressive face and in his wide eyes. Despite his excitement, there had also been fear that sunk deep into his heart with a certain feeling of, _'What would happen if I compete? Would the others be nice? How would they take me?'_ and general, angsty fear. He considered the possibility that the other kids would be delighted to meet him (if only to feel calm for just a moment) and then quickly dismissed it when he remember that, indeed, he was a shy genius at least two years younger than everyone else.

The teachers would be delighted of course. They always were, at the prospect of a _genius_. To Spencer is was another weakness of his. The other children jeered at him, "Teachers pet," like being kind and polite was a bad thing. His teachers knew that he wasn't challenged by anything they through at him, and thus allowed him to read and do his own thing. They only made him complete the assignments and tests, both of which he always breezed through with ease.

Being smart was _boring_.

Scratch that. Boring didn't even begin to describe Spencer's average state of mind. No matter how many grades he skipped and college courses he took and no matter how many new authors he discovered he still found himself bored. Reading twenty thousand words a minute didn't help, either, given that Spencer could finish the average book in eight minutes or less. It was most definitely an unhelpful factor when it came to having stuff to do. The college courses were also easy, given that Spencer had an eidetic memory and remembered everything he had ever heard, seen, tasted, felt or smelled. Boring was so far from accurate that Spencer, with an IQ estimated to be over two-hundred when he wasn't concussed and only slightly lower when he was (which was how he initially took the Binet IQ test for the first time at the age of six).

He felt like Sherlock Holmes sometimes, smarter than everyone else but slightly underestimated in his abilities. And also, so far beyond bored all the time that it was simply ridiculous. Of course, Spencer never shot himself up with copious amounts of cocaine or chased serial killers and other psychos through the underbelly of Las Vegas, but he did do plenty of stuff that the average ten year old didn't. For one, he did not celebrate double digits with a new video game or toy and rather received a lifetime library pass (that worked at libraries all across Nevada), and a large pile of exactly twenty books (the math was beyond easy- ten for his age and multiplied by two for his parents).

By all means, the World Scholar's Cup (an event that had never been hosted in Las Vegas before and not even founded before two years back) sounded like an excellent way to ease off of his boredom and try something new because _for Freud's disproved theories he could only spend so much time beating the crap out of other people no matter what way it came about_. It wasn't actually clear if Sigmund Freud had been correct about certain things or not. The man had pioneered the idea of the subconscious (which wasn't a psychologically correct term and rather _unconscious_ was used) even existing and Spencer certainly believed in his subconscious. It helped him absorb information, processing up to eleven million bits of information each second. For most people, only two thousand of these were consciously noted but Spencer had a tendency to bring in more information than that.

The constant absorbance of information led Spencer to doing strange things sometimes- totally losing track of reality (because, come on? What sort of person processed that much and worked at a million miles a minute the whole time?) and sensory processing disorder (in which he experienced sensory overload and was unable to function like a normal human being until given a period of time in a dimly lit, relatively undecorated room).

Spencer's thought process grew quicker and he decided on what he was going to do. Enter, of course. The school was paying for entrance fees and transportation to the host school (a lovely private school that Spencer would have loved to attend because bullying was far beyond strictly forbidden and punishable by expulsion and that would have been _lovely_ ) along with food. There was no way that he was going to turn down something that sounded this interesting for anything.

Except maybe his mom. Spencer tended to do very extreme things for his mother, such as going into the underbelly of Las Vegas to find his low level gang connection that, somehow, got Spencer the medication that his mother needed for her schizophrenia. If his mom had asked Spencer not to participate, he would step away immediately.

A month later, the review material had been thoroughly memorized and Spencer had discovered all he possibly could have on the topic of _An Imperfect World_. He had read articles about faltering states, and what happened when a state faltered (as that was the socials studies area of study). He had memorized the public health requirements of all of the states in the world and was an expert on crime and justice. The last was largely due to his father, but there you go.

There had been little to study for the art, literature and music sections, but at the least he had manuscripts of each buried away in his head, ready to be called forth at a moments notice.

It seemed that the only downside to the event was the team debate section, in which they were scored on their ability to argue with other groups. Despite the fact that he spoke with a ferocious stutter, Spencer had been placed on a team with a pair of Freshman, both of whom had never been unkind to him and both of whom were intelligent and stutter-less. He wondered, briefly, what would happen if his voice abruptly decided to abandon him during team debate, if they would allow Mikayla or Oliver to speak on his behest.

Mikayla Bell was fourteen years old. She had long, brown hair that hung to midway down her back and was almost always swept up in a long French braid or in a ponytail that had a tendency to accidentally flick people in the face. She had a relatively average face (which is to say beautiful, given that Spencer didn't believe that facial shapes defined beauty and rather the mind beneath) and bright chocolate eyes flecked with little bits of gold. While she was average on the outside, on the inside she was anything but average. With a quick wit, kind soul and the ability to make anyone melt (either with happiness or horror), she had a special gift.

Her younger brother by nine months, Oliver, was thirteen and technically not old enough to be in Freshman year, but their parents hadn't given a crap about that. He had shaggy brown hair that was remarkably similar to Mikayla's. Likewise, he had an average face and beautiful mind, with hauntingly similar chocolate brown eyes. He was also similar to Mikayla in personality, but had far better puppy eyes that even rivalled Spencer's.

Neither Bell child had any idea that Spencer already had a doctorate (fifteenth century literature, which he had gained with little to no help from his mother. His dissertation had been on the way that papyrus and handwriting had influenced the literature) and was working on a second one, but both treated him kindly and that was all that Spencer asked for.

Gently, almost too much so for Spencer's tastes but kinder than he was used to, Mikayla bumped her shoulder against Spencer's. Her voice was light and teasing. "Looking forward to this, Spencer?"

He grinned at the taller youth with large hazel eyes wide and unblinking. "Yup," he chirped.

Over the years, Spencer had learned to speak like most people sung, using the different intonations and pitches to help convey different emotions that he wasn't so good at under normal circumstances. He kept an internal booklet of emotions and how to recognize them, along with how to present them in ways that made him normal. Even though he knew that Mikayla and Oliver would be nice to him either way.

Oliver grinned at him like a cheerful elf, his slightly wild hair sticking out less than normal. Spencer recognized him as excited by the skip in his step. He, too, chirped, "I can't wait for the writing bit."

They hadn't attended primary or middle school together, and rather Spencer had only met Mikayla and Oliver at the beginning of the year in their Psychology 101 course where Spencer had been grouped with Oliver, as he was the closest in age to Spencer and the teacher believed that youth meant inability to focus or understand and therefore wanted the students most likely to be idiots to work together. They had proudly turned in a co-written essay and works cited for Freud's theories and how they were incorrect. It had been marked as one of the best in the class, and the teacher's opinion had abruptly been changed.

Coincidentally, their psychology teacher was among the ones who had organized the groups for the World Scholar's Cup, and had promptly informed the other teachers how good of friends the three were and thus they were grouped together as a super-team.

When their bus pulled up to Summerlin Academy for the Gifted, a exclusive private school that catered largely to children with high IQs and inflated egos, Spencer brightened up and glanced out of the window at the large, modern building with walls of glass. It didn't look like a high school, which was probably a good thing given that most of their students would graduate early, and rather had the designs that were more likely to be found at a small but respectable college.

Slowly, the students of North Las Vegas Secondary School emptied from the bus. It was about eight thirty, and they had a half hour until they absolutely had to be in the Academy's theatre. Despite knowing that he was beyond prepared, a little burst of fear snuck upon Spencer and he shifted closer to the Bell's.

Mikayla, almost a head taller than Spencer, brushed her hand against Spencer's arm and he used the touch to ground himself and back away from the outside stimuli.

An hour later, Spencer's team (Team 135) sat in a room set up for the debate competition. There were three tables, two somewhat aligned but with the other end turned inwards so that both were on an angle. Each of these had three chairs in front of it. Spencer sat at the far edge, with Mikayla to his left and Oliver on her other side. There was a slight pile of papers in front of each of them, and a computer behind that. Spencer twirled a pen absently, looking at the final table. This was set up with only one chair, for their judge, who would decide who won the debate.

At the table parallel to Spencer's, there was another team preparing. It was an all boys group, with their table set up similarly to Spencer's. The first was about Oliver's height, the second a couple inches taller than that and the final one close to Spencer's height. They were all dressed in school uniforms, their ties crooked.

Fifteen minutes following that, their judge arrived. "The resolution is that lying on the internet should be illegal," the man announced and Spencer was almost instantly delighted to be on the affirmative. Of course, it was often considered the easier side to argue but in the end it didn't matter - what made one side easier was agreeing with it.

"Pedophilia," he said, seemingly out of the blue, but the others caught on instantly and nodded for him to go onwards. "Just last year, eleven year old Allison Carver of Moapa Valley, Nevada was kidnapped by a sexual predator and found dead three hours after an amber alert was issued. She had previous correspondence with the predator online, during which the predator, John Murphy, pretended to be a fourth grade boy from the local middle school."

Long since used to his bursts of knowledge, Mikayla said, "Cheerful," and quickly moved onwards to their next point, which she soon announced to be internet scams, and how easy it was for a person to be robbed blind with scams using covers such as fake insurance companies.

Spencer spun in his chair. "A week ago, the White Collar section of the FBI busted a fake insurance company using their insurance company to con hundreds of people out of large sums of money, most of which is currently being returned to it's rightful owners."

At this point, Oliver let out a soft laugh despite the severity of what they were discussing. "You've just got the whole world in your mind, don't you Spence."

The younger boy looked over. "That is physically impossible, given the amounts that we don't know and the thousands of languages I don't speak."

It continued on as such for the following fifteen minutes, and by then they had a world of knowledge at their disposal. The debate section turned out to be relatively easy, their team winning all of their three debates despite the fact that Spencer started stuttering after the second debate. The last topic irritated him to no end - would Las Vegas survive a zombie outbreak?

The other team refused to follow proper debate protocol (a theoretical situation allowing for the affirmative team, who spoke first, to set the stage for the world that this was happening in. In that scenario, Mikayla, Oliver and Spencer quickly agreed that the 'zombie outbreak' was caused by a parasite that could not survive outside of a living body for all that long. It slowly ate the person's brains before they eventually passed away and the parasite had to find a new host.

Due to the nature of the parasite, in such a scenario Las Vegas would be placed under quarantine and they would all die. Obviously.

Ah, the indisputable nature of logic.

The collaborative writing section was beyond easy. In a moment, Spencer had spewed onto his page a hundred facts about previous crimes and serial killers and the relation between violent acts in the past and future.

 _Referred to as the Macdonald or Homicidal Triad, there are three common behaviours found in the pasts of future serial killers. First among these is arson, or the act of compulsively lighting property on fire as a way to relieve the anger that one feels. An arsonist is similar to a drug addict, a person who is always looking for their next fix. Except, in this case that fix is fire. The next among these behaviours is abuse towards animals. Again, this is a way for a budding serial killer to relieve their extra emotions. Finally is compulsive bedwetting above the age of ten. Two of the three of these behaviours commonly found in future serial killers are labelled as violent crimes. For this reason, I firmly believe that there is a relation between violent crimes in one's past and the yet more violent crimes a person may commit in the future._

 _The notorious serial killer, James Reynolds, was caught after an FBI team investigated a group of people for expunged childhood offences. Reynold's record included arsony, cruelty towards animals and vandalizing. At the age of 32, Reynolds became one of 'America's Worst Spree Killers' and was referenced by a book of that title written by Agent David Rossi. Rossi explains the psychology behind Reynolds - that of a bored sociopath. Before he was caught, Reynolds took the lives of eleven American men and women._

It wasn't a hard topic to argue, certainly not. When on the hunt for most criminals, the FBI would pull up records for people living in a certain area and narrow down the suspect pool with past violent crimes. The notorious and infamous murderer Ted Bundy had not committed any crimes, per say, but had once surrounded his grandmother's bed with every knife in the house and stood at the foot of the bed smiling.

They were not to receive news on that for quite some time, and thus the three scholars returned to their comfortable homes for the night before returning at nine the following morning.

And by all of the disproved theories in the entire world, was the Scholar's Challenge _easy_ _._ A hundred and twenty questions in a sixty minute span, all of them multiple choice and all of them simple things that Spencer had picked up in the few hours of reading on the varying topics that were to be covered.

He finished it in ten minutes, and then spent the next fifty spinning on his chair. Oliver shot him an amused look every few minutes and the person watching all of them take their 'exam' smiled at him when he offered her a piece of the brownie he had packed for lunch. He could specifically recall the set of rules - bribery via food was, indeed, permitted. Alpaca drawings here labeled as preferable but not mandatory, so he decorated an extra page with a lovely young alpaca with cheese sitting on it's head. In large, bubble letters he scrawled, "Pwaa."

They ate lunch, Spencer happily chewing on his remaining brownie whilst he watched his tablemates bicker. There was a boy from another public high school, who was all smiles and there was a prim girl from a small private school. They had somehow gotten into an argument about the persecution of varying crimes. How that happened, Spencer hadn't the slightest idea.

The World Scholar's Bowl was also easy. Very easy. But also very fun. Five possible choices, only one ever being correct and other teams shouting out possible answers in the large auditorium as their time slowly trickled away and hasty decisions were made.

Each correct answer was worth a certain number of points and with those points a team either did better or worse. Towards the end, they called up the highest scoring teams from the Scholar's Challenge and Spencer's was called up and they ended up answering for about a fourth of the people in the auditorium, getting each answer (and Spencer was quite sure of this) correct.

Some idiot thought that having a huge reward ceremony was a good idea.

First was the junior division's highest scoring teams in the Scholar's Bowl. Honourable mentions and then the top three. Spencer scanned the list in a matter of a few milliseconds, tapping his friend's shoulders. "We got first," he stage whispered and wasn't _that_ a surprise they were only a team with an average IQ of 150 and a doctorate. They slipped through the rows, making their way to the front as the senior division was called up. The winner's were from a private school in downtown Las Vegas.

Individual debaters were up next, and both Mikayla and Oliver received an honourable mention whilst Spencer happily remained in his seat, content in the knowledge that public speaking was not his thing. He did, however, thoroughly intend to make it his thing for the coming years. The best junior writers were up next, and Spencer happily took first with Oliver in third and Mikayla receiving an honourable mentions.

The Scholar's Cup consisted of, namely, six different sections. Arts, history, literature, science, social studies and the special area. There was an individual winner for each and then an overall winner. Spencer took the total score, socials studies and the special area. Mikayla took the arts and Oliver literature, whilst science and history went to a pair of kids from a large private school.

Whoever planned this whole thing really liked medals, Spencer realized as they called up honourable mentions for each of the categories in, only, the Scholar's Challenge. Spencer had an honourable mentions in all of them. Fourth place, save for social studies and the special area, both of which he got first in.

Following that were the top debate teams of the junior division. Spencer's team took third with pride, exchanging large smiles and short laughs.

The top writing teams were called up next, and (as expected) Spencer's team took third. Really, at a certain point winning got boring. They also received second place for the top Challenge team. Spencer took overall top scholar from the Secondary School of Las Vegas. The next group they referred to as Da Vinci Scholar's, who were amazing in all the subjects rather than just one. Spencer took another award for this category. Spencer took third for the Champion Scholar's.

As expected, their team easily qualified for the Global Rounds that were to take place in, for the first time, Ottawa, Canada. Which was a breath of fresh air, given that they were normally in major Asian cities. Spencer could definitely make Canada.

Then Team 135 received the champion team from the junior division.

Honestly, what was with these awards?


End file.
